There was only a moment of hesitation before the thugs dropped their weapons and put their hands up. As they were handcuffed and led away, I finally let myself sit down.
My legs were killing me, the muscles screaming “YOU ARE NOT ATHLETIC” at top volume while I tried not to listen, or acknowledge the trembling in my legs.
I briefly looked over the herd, as I saw the flashing lights of an ambulance rolling up the road and onto the grass. The worst hurt ponies were loaded up immediately, a few of their family and friends going with them, and that ambulance left.
A dark pain in my heart faded, knowing that they would be taken care of. But there wasn’t only one ambulance. Two more rolled in, just as the first left. The herd dwindled to about half its original size as many of them were shuttled off quickly, both to get them out of the area and to get them to the hospital where there were more resources.
I fought a little in my head with the realization that my brief stint as one of the leaders of the herd had gone fairly well. Nopony had died. It didn’t feel like a celebratory statement, but considering the odds we’d faced, it was a miracle that we’d all made it out alive. Even though many ponies were now on their way to a hospital.
Stephanie, the CIA agent, was the next to get pulled aside once the herd was drained of injured ponies. Then the doctor as well, Nate being very jittery and avoiding anyone’s gaze as they examined his hand, and bloodied knuckles and cheek.
Then a crowd of EMTs descended on us. Bustling us each to a different ambulance to be examined, something was mumbled about VIPs and I imagine because we are Elements of Harmony, they wanted to make sure we were okay first.
“Let’s get you taken care of, honey. Where does it hurt most?”
My EMT was a slender guy with dark hair pulled back in a short ponytail, and eyes that took in my face and expression before my injuries. He was caring for me like I cared for my animals. Make sure they will stay calm, relax them, then help them.
He helped me up onto a stretcher before I gave him my answer, and as I talked I realized that I hurt, all over. I must look terrible. One of my eyes was squinting constantly, my hooves hurt, my muscles hurt, I had a cut on my side that I didn’t remember getting, and a bruise forming on my side which felt like my ribs had been kicked by the thugs when they took me out of the trunk, which they might have. I didn’t remember.
While I tried to sort through my pains, he was wiping my hooves and fetlocks with disinfectant wipes, making sure the dirt and grime was gone.
“This cut here stings a lot,” I said as I pointed to the scabbed cut in my stomach area.
I spotted AJ looking towards me, and I tried to smile but I didn’t know if she saw, before the EMT applied something to the cut that made me whimper.
He was cleaning it, that was all. The scab wasn’t clean, so he had to dissolve it and put a clean bandage on it, before wrapping gauze around my midsection to hold it in place. Then, he paused, looking to me gently, waiting for me to continue. I could tell he knew who I was, or maybe he just genuinely treated everyone with this level of gentle patience. But I appreciated it deeply.
His nametag read “Tim” and while I pondered my injuries, he put a hand over my hoof, gentle enough not to hurt but enough to show me he was listening. That he cared.
“There’s a bruise in my side that is making it tough to breathe,” I mentioned, before carefully extending one of my wings.
It ached terribly, and I was very relieved when he put a hand under it so I could relax it, letting the slight weight rest on his arm.
He checked it over carefully, asked me some questions to clarify that I could move in certain ways and that breathing itself didn’t hurt, just the muscles, and eventually decided that I might have cracked a rib but not broken it. I would have to get an x-ray sometime soon, but I seemed stable.
It was comfortingly routine, and he kept his voice at the same volume as I did, guiding me through motions and how to check myself over. As I was explaining the hit to my eye and that I could still see, I looked back over to AJ and Rarity, and I saw AJ looking towards me.
Feeling a warmth in my heart, I smiled and waved. AJ waved back and gave me a tired smile. The EMT was gentle, and let me finish my wave before he tested my vision to make sure my eye was working okay even if the lid was swollen.
As he was having me lay down while he took my vitals, I heard a voice I recognized getting closer.
“Hardly an average evening, I’d say. It’s no wonder everypony is a tad on edge,” Rarity was saying as she approached.
I turned my head to see her coming closer, and smiled a little as I saw Sweetie Belle next to her.
“Yeah, but… Like… The agents could at least be nice to the fucking ponies, you know? We’re the good guys!”
My brain very briefly short-circuited at watching Sweetie Belle say “fuck” and Rarity’s only response being to chuckle. But I had to keep reminding myself, they’re merged. This stuff is going to happen.
People change, after all. That’s always been true.
Best friends stop having time, drift away, and forget your nicknames. People with the same hobbies find other people that share them, and who are more convenient to meet with, or better at it. Family grows older, and decays with the passing of years, the quirks that made them familiar fade or are magnified, becoming deeply buried flaws.
How could I possibly complain about people or ponies changing when I had changed so much myself? Fluttershy fixing a pistol. Erica risking her life for someone she doesn’t know. Fluttershy attacking someone else using her own element of harmony. Erica breathing deep in the moments of vulnerability, and allowing that weakness to become her, instead of fighting.
Oh how I had changed. I wondered if my parents or brothers would even recognize me.
“Shy! Erishy!”
Sweetie had hopped up on the ambulance’s bumper and was waving, I’d zoned out quite a bit but I looked down to her and Rarity with a little smile.
“Hey there… Um… I’m so sorry but I don’t think I’ve been told your new names?” I asked as gently as I could, feeling a bit of shame at not knowing.
But of course they weren’t upset.
“Raritony and May Belle,” the filly on the bumper said, pointing to her sister then herself. “And you’re Erishy right? Or Eris, I heard someone else say that.”
“Erishy is fine,” I chuckled, remembering briefly saying Eris to someone, but I couldn’t remember who.
“So, how is our dear Erishy faring, doctor?” Raritony asked as she looked to the EMT who was writing something down on a clipboard.
“She’s well,” he replied quickly after looking to me and getting a nod that I didn’t mind. “I’d advise all of you visit an actual hospital as soon as possible for xrays and evaluations, but I understand getting to New York is an urgent matter. Technically Erishy is able to travel, though I’d recommend a lot of fluids, rest, and slow movements. If we could find a wheelchair that she could operate on her own, I’d get one for her. But for now, maybe being carried or just being very gentle on herself. Also, I’ve got a cool pack for your eye, I just wanted to give it a bit of time to thaw so it could be shaped,” he said as he gestured to a blue freezer-pack looking thing on the shelf next to him.
But I was staring at him a bit more stunned than I’d expected. Wheelchair? Carried? I couldn’t slow everypony down. Not now, not when everything was so important. An image appeared in my mind of a nurse carrying me, limp and helpless, while the other five elements stood tall and proud.
“Erishy, dear?”
I came around again. Maybe I was just tired, terribly tired, or maybe I was a bit lost in my own head, but I’d been staring off into the distance too often lately.
“Yes, Raritony?” I asked as I did my best to smile as I looked back to her.
“We’re going to go tell Rae Jay what’s happening, we will be back in no time,” she said confidently, before reaching up and tapping my hoof with hers.
They then headed back towards the group. Leaving me laying on a stretcher with Tim, and my thoughts.
“I have a few minutes until this thaws enough, okay? I’m going to check in with some other patients and I’ll be right back,” he reassured me as he put a hand on my foreleg. “You stay here, no getting up. Let yourself relax and we will take care of you.”
I nodded numbly, as I watched one of the agents laughing from the bumper of an ambulance where she was getting her arm wrapped up while Raritony walked up next to RJ, saying something into her ear. I tried not to guess at what it might be. I wasn’t exactly holding up the team at the moment.
I recognized the agent as Stephanie, the one that helped us escape, and the black agent who walked up next to her was the one whose shoulder May had ridden in on, so I could guess they were our agents, meant to look after the team.
I looked at the element of kindness on the stretcher next to me. The burned spot on my chest had healed already, it was a little red but with some ointment and a wrap, it looked like it would be okay. But without that pink and gold armor, I felt a little empty. Like a hurt little pegasus without anyone to hold onto as I cried.
I shoved that thought away and looked back towards the clustered group of agents and ponies, as though watching them could make me feel like I was over there.
Then Rarity pointed away. Towards an SUV. Tears pricked at the edges of my eyes.
“No,” I whispered, hooves shaking as I turned onto my stomach, realizing I knew what was happening.
The mission had to be completed. They were going to the car. They had figured out I would only hold them up and they were going to get in that SUV and I’d be alone. Again. Forever. I knew, deeply, that I needed to be strong right now.
But the only strength I could find in that moment of fear and timid pain, was the strength to cry out when I was in need, instead of resigning to my fate.
“Wait.” I insisted, only loud enough for a nearby officer to hear, and look towards me quizically. But I wasn’t looking at him.
My heart was beating with a heavy thud, like it hurt to even have a heart at all. My lower jaw was trembling and the panic in my mind was overwhelming. A drowning tidal wave slowly rising over my head.
“WAIT!” I finally screamed, rising from a crouch to stand fully, wobbling and barely staying upright.
Everyone in the area froze, but more importantly I saw RJ and Raritony look towards me.
The stretcher was low, and I almost fell just getting down from it, my wings popping out to steady me before I stumbled out of the ambulance and onto the ground.
It hurt. It all hurt, every ounce of flesh and every drop of soul in me burned with shame and fear, and I accepted that it was all I was. There was nothing but this feeling in me, and I couldn’t fight it as I bit my lip, tried to blink away the tears, and staggered towards my friends.
“Wait!” I cried out a second time.
They seemed terrified, maybe even scared of me as I made my way across the grass, my legs barely holding me up, my heart beating out of my chest, and in a final bid to make them understand I called out from so far away.
“Don’t leave me! Please don’t!”